by Lis Wiehl
“You’ll have five minutes to make your presentation. There are only two rules. One is to both address the jury and examine the witness—in this case, the subject. And the other is to make it interesting.”
Interesting, Eli thought as the students began to pair up. Well, if there’s one thing his life was right now, it was interesting. And he found himself wondering if the presence of Mia Quinn might make it even more interesting.
Eli was walking back to his car when he heard a commotion at the other end of the parking lot. A woman was shouting, “Get away from me. Get away!”
And he knew that voice.
CHAPTER 29
Are you okay?” Eli asked Mia between ragged gasps of breath. She had heard him yell out, “I’m coming!” before he had sprinted across the parking lot to her. Now he leaned over and put his hands on his knees, but his eyes never left Mia’s face.
“I’m fine,” she said, and then burst into tears as the reality of what had just happened—or almost happened—hit her.
He snapped straight up and put one hand on her shoulder. “Did he hurt you?”
“No, no. He was just following me. At first I thought I was imagining it, but he kept walking faster and faster. That’s when I realized I was really in trouble.” She had turned and yelled at the man to go away. He hadn’t done that, but had stopped about fifty feet from her, standing in a pool of shadow. The night had been quiet except for the sounds of his harsh breathing. Then Eli had shouted from the far parking lot. After a second’s hesitation the man had turned and run the other way.
“We should report this to security,” Eli said decisively.
“And tell them what? Some guy in a baseball cap and hoodie was following me? That’s how half the kids on this campus dress. I didn’t hear his voice or even see his face.” She would make a terrible witness. She hadn’t noticed the colors of his clothes or any logos. She had noticed nothing. It was like part of her had shut down when she realized she was in danger.
“What do you think he wanted?”
“Probably my purse.” At least Mia hoped it was that.
“You’d make a better target than most of these girls,” Eli said thoughtfully. “They probably don’t have much cash, let alone credit cards.”
Eli looked surprised when Mia started laughing.
The next day Mia stood beside Charlie in front of the gray two-story Dutch Colonial that belonged to Vincent Riester, a.k.a. Tall, Dark, and Handsome. All of his e-mails to Colleen, no matter what time of day, had come from the same IP address, which matched up with Vincent’s home address. Mia and Charlie had decided it would be better to show up unannounced.
In the car on the way over they had argued over suspects. Charlie favored Gina and wanted to take a closer look at Violet. Mia didn’t feel either woman could have done it. She still thought it was likely either a disgruntled defendant or someone connected with Second Amendment Seattle. About the only thing she and Charlie had agreed on was that it was simply too convoluted to think that a gun control advocate had murdered one of their own.
Foregoing the bell, Charlie knocked three times on the heavy wooden door.
Footsteps echoed across a hardwood floor. Then a blue eye stared out at them through the peephole.
“Vincent Riester?” When there was no answer, Charlie held up his ID. “Seattle Police. We’d like to talk to you.”
After a long moment, a lock turned and the door swung back.
Mia let out an involuntary gasp.
The man in front of them barely looked human. His face could have belonged to an alien or a monster. His left eye was an empty red slant of flesh. The tip of his nose was missing, revealing two dark tunnels. The scars from skin grafts crisscrossed his face like lines on a map. His odd, flesh-colored lips appeared to be melting off his face.
“A fire?” Charlie asked in a conversational tone. He appeared completely unruffled.
The other man nodded. “Three years ago a drunk driver hit the car I was in and crushed it against a building. I was trapped. Then the car caught on fire.”
Mia shuddered. What had it been like to be unable to move away from the flames?
“I’ve had thirty-seven surgeries,” he continued, “but all the king’s horses and all the king’s men can’t put Vincent Riester back together again.”
His words were clear, so the damage hadn’t gotten deep enough to damage his tongue or teeth. Mia wondered, a little giddy with horror, if it could be termed cosmetic, but then she caught sight of his hands. His right arm was now nothing but a stub ending midway between his elbow and nonexistent wrist, and his left hand was missing the tips of the ring and pinky fingers.
It was this hand that he held out. “And yes, I’m Vincent Riester.”
“Charlie Carlson,” Charlie said, shaking it. “And this is Mia Quinn.” She pressed his fingers awkwardly and then released them. “Can we come in?”
“Of course.” Stepping back, Riester opened the door wider. The living room was decorated with heavy oak furniture and old brass floor lamps. One long wall held built-in bookshelves that stretched from floor to ceiling. Even with that much space, books were still stacked sideways and layered on top of rows. In the background classical music played softly. Mia thought it was Rachmaninoff.
Like Darin Dane’s house, here all the blinds and curtains were closed. Was it to keep the outside world from seeing Riester—or him from observing their reaction when they did? Mia’s skin was hot with shame at her unmuffled gasp.
“So what is this regarding?” Riester asked as they sat down. If he was anxious about their visit, his voice didn’t show it.
“You’re a member of eHeartMatch?” Charlie asked.
“Yes. Why?” He sounded genuinely puzzled.
“And you use the screen name Tall, Dark, and Handsome?”
“That’s my real photo on the profile. What I really looked like before. And I guess I’m still tall and dark.” His voice held a little more bite.
“We want to talk to you about a woman named Colleen Miller. You may have known her as Irish Red.”
“ ‘Known her’?” Riester echoed, his voice sharpening, and it seemed to Mia that some of his carefully maintained composure crumbled. “Why are you using the past tense? What’s happened? Is something wrong with Colleen?”
His concern sounded genuine, but his face was so scarred and stretched there was no way to read his expressions. But Mia realized she could still observe how he positioned his body, how he moved, whether his gestures matched his words or seemed out of sync.
Right now Riester was facing them head-on, without turning away or slumping, as people who were lying or planning on lying might. He wasn’t leaning back in an unconscious effort to put more distance between them. As she watched, he crossed his arms over his belly, his hand and his stub pressed against his sides. That could indicate defensiveness but could also be self-soothing, filling an unconscious need to give himself a hug. Or maybe, Mia thought, mocking herself for overanalyzing, Riester was in the habit of tucking what remained of his hands out of sight so that he didn’t have to endure stares like hers.
While she was thinking this, Charlie said bluntly, “Colleen’s been found dead.”
Riester flinched as if Charlie had stuck him. “Dead? Colleen?”
“Yes.”
He let his head drop and put his hand over his eyes. Finally he took a ragged breath and straightened up. “You mean she was murdered?”
Mia leaned forward. “Why do you ask that?”
A snort came out of his wreck of a nose. “You don’t need to be a genius to realize that the police are only going to be asking questions if it wasn’t a natural death.” He pressed his pale lips together. “What happened?”
“Someone killed her Sunday night around eight o’clock at her house. She was shot through a window and died a few minutes later.”
Riester closed his eyes. The three of them sat in silence for a long moment. Finally he looked back up at
them with his one good eye. “Do you have any suspects?”
“Not yet,” Charlie said. “But we need to ask you—where were you on Sunday evening around eight p.m.?”
“What?” His jaw dropped. “You actually think I could have killed her?”
“We’re talking to a lot of people,” Mia said.
“I was here. I’m always here. I don’t ever go out.”
“Never?” Charlie asked.
“I’m just lucky I live at this time in history. I can do pretty much everything I want on the Internet. I work on it—I’m a freelance writer. I’m actually pretty fast for a three-fourths-handed typist. On the Internet I can order groceries, watch movies, make new friends . . .”
“When was the last time you were in contact with Colleen?” Charlie asked.
“We’ve never actually met. Our . . . relationship was carried out solely over the Internet and the phone. We were e-mailing that night. It can’t have been that long before she”—he hesitated—“died.”
“We found your correspondence with her,” Mia said. “You were trying to break things off. Why?”
His skin-colored lips—which Mia now realized must be the product of another skin graft—twisted. “It’s been fun. It’s been more than fun. But I couldn’t let it go to the next level, the way Colleen wanted me to. And if she wouldn’t accept that, then I had to end things. It was better for both of us.”
“The next level?” Mia asked.
“She’s been insisting that we meet.”
“And that’s a bad thing?”
“Colleen isn’t the only woman I know online. But since the accident, I’ve only been out on a date once. It wasn’t that long after it happened. The woman excused herself to go to the bathroom and never came back.” Riester sucked in a breath. “I can still see with one eye. And do you know what I see? I see people’s horror. Their pity. Their disgust.” His gaze pierced Mia. “I saw it on your face today when I opened the door. And you know what? I feel the same way. I took all the mirrors down in the house. I shave by touch. I don’t ever want to be reminded of what I look like now. Of how I’m a monster.”
“But you’re not a monster inside,” Mia protested. Charlie cut her a look, reminding her that they were there to find Colleen’s killer, not offer absolution.
“Human beings are hardwired to think certain things,” Riester said. “They see a baby’s snub nose and big eyes, and they think, Ooh, how cute. And when they see someone who looks like me, they think, Monster. And they are also hardwired to think that the inside matches the outside.” He was quiet for a moment, and then looked at Mia with his one good eye. “I know about you from her e-mails. She said you were her friend.”
“That’s true.” Mia wondered where he was going with this.
“Then why don’t you know about me? If she really was serious about me, why didn’t she tell her best friend?”
It was the same question Mia had asked herself earlier, when she had doubted her friendship with Colleen. But now Riester was drawing his own painful conclusions.
“I don’t know,” she said simply. “Maybe she wondered if it was real.”
Mia remembered what Colleen had said about not liking what you might find when you lifted up a rock. When you worked in the legal system, it wasn’t hard to find out someone’s home address, even if it wasn’t for a strictly law enforcement–related reason. Colleen could have grown suspicious about why Riester was pushing her away. If she had seen Riester’s real face, would she still have wanted him?
“She might have reacted differently than you think.” Mia spoke almost to herself.
“Okay,” Riester said in an uninflected voice, “say that Colleen had really grown to love the real me, the me I still am inside. Could she have gone out with me in public and felt comfortable? Even when I wear a hooded sweatshirt and a baseball cap and sunglasses, everyone still stares. Some even point. Could she have introduced me to her friends and family and co-workers and been prepared for their reactions? She would have tried to find ways not to look at my face. And would she ever have wanted to kiss these lips? Have me touch her with this hand?” He held it up. “Online, I usually tell women that I’m a trauma surgeon and that I work crazy hours. That keeps the pressure off, for a while.”
The words burst out of Mia: “Is it just a game to you?”
He regarded her calmly. “I told you I was hit by a drunk driver. But he wasn’t the only person who was drunk that night. We all were. Me, my girlfriend, him. My girlfriend had decided that she was the least drunk of the two of us, so she was driving my car when we got hit. Her arm was broken, and she got some cuts and bruises, but otherwise she wasn’t too badly hurt. The important thing was that she was still able to get out. But she didn’t come back to help me even when I screamed at her that my leg was caught. She didn’t come back even when I told her that I could see flames and begged her to help me. She didn’t come back, even when I started screaming.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “She just stood there and watched me burn.”
CHAPTER 30
Mia couldn’t get Riester’s terrible story out of her head. Like she needed anything else to feel bad about, anyone else to fret over.
At least after today, Mia wouldn’t have to worry about how to make the Suburban’s payments. And that was a good thing, she told herself as she sat at the car dealership, signing again and again each time the notary pointed.
Sitting next to her was Craig Silverman, the man who had seen her listing on the website that paired up people who needed to get out of a lease with people who were willing to take over the car and payments. Under his bristling mustache Craig had a wide, white smile.
And he should be smiling. He was getting a good deal. Mia had just seen the paperwork Scott had originally signed, and he had paid a hefty deposit for the Suburban. That money was gone now.
Mia signed her name one last time. Craig smiled even more broadly and shook her hand. Then she handed over the two sets of car keys and fobs.
Blinking back tears, she walked out to the dealer’s parking lot where her dad was waiting in the waning afternoon sunlight. She opened the door and climbed in without speaking.
“Ready to go?” he asked.
Mia managed a nod. They drove in silence for five minutes. Then Mia let out a shaky sigh.
“You okay?” Her dad shot her a concerned look. He didn’t know how bad things were, but she thought he was beginning to guess.
“It’s been a tough week. And tomorrow’s going to be a long day. I’ve got two funerals to go to.”
“Two? One must be for your friend Colleen, but who’s the other one for?”
“Darin Dane. A boy who committed suicide after being harassed in high school.”
Her dad’s eyes widened. “Oh no. Is he a friend of Gabe’s?”
“No, thank goodness. They’re the same age, but they go to different schools. We’re investigating Darin’s death to see if we can charge the bullies with something.”
He nodded. “What are Brooke and Gabe doing while you’re at the funerals?”
“I’m taking them to Colleen’s funeral, since they both knew her pretty well.” Mia hadn’t told her dad about how she had asked Gabe to listen to what turned out to be Colleen’s last breaths. “And I’ll have Gabe watch Brooke while I’m at Darin’s funeral in the morning and then during Colleen’s wake.”
“Why don’t you let me do that? In fact, I can watch Brooke all day. She’s really too young to understand a funeral.”
Was he judging her? “She’ll be fine. And Gabe can watch her before and after.”
“I want to do it. And I know it’s really none of my business, Mia, but sometimes I think that since Scott died you’ve been too hard on the boy.”
And what did her dad know about being a single parent? When he left their mom, he had also left her and Peter.
“The truth is, Dad, I was too easy on him before. Scott and I were both too easy. Gabe basically didn’t have any responsi
bilities. If he left his homework at home, he knew I would drop it off at the school. I never asked him to help cook or clean. The only chore we consistently said he was responsible for was putting out the garbage and the recycling. And half the time I was the one who ended up taking it out to the curb. But Gabe’s fourteen now. He’s got to learn responsibility sometime.”
At least Mia hoped he was getting better about taking responsibility. Sometimes it seemed like Gabe was just getting better at whining. At being resentful. At being secretive.
“Lately he’s got this idea that he needs to be bigger,” she said. “I think it’s from football. He says he wants muscles.” She thought of Darin, of how the other kids had picked on him. At fourteen, maybe the only important thing in your life was to fit in. “When I came home on Wednesday, he and some friends from the team had been lifting Scott’s weights in the basement. That and basically eating anything that wasn’t nailed down. But when I came in, one of those guys stood up, shook my hand, looked me straight in the eye, and asked me about my job.” She exhaled sharply. “I have a feeling that if Gabe met some adult he didn’t know, he would just stand there all slouched with his hair hanging in his eyes and barely rouse himself to say hi.”
“You never know,” her dad said. “Your kids are sometimes different with other people than they are with you.” He took a deep breath, and she saw his hands tighten on the steering wheel. “I know I wasn’t that good of a dad when you were growing up, but now I want to be around more for you, Mia.”
The admission must have cost him. The dad she knew—or used to know—hadn’t needed anyone, but now he seemed to need her. But this wasn’t what she needed, her dad wanting more of her time. Not now, when she barely had time to turn around. When Mia was twelve she would have given anything to hang out with her dad. Instead she had gone weeks, even months, without seeing him.